Happy Birthday to ME!!!!

Yes, it's true, today is my birthday ~ 63 years old today! I am a person who loves her birthday, always have, but I don't have many people surrounding me who feel the same way. I don't know how I did it, I raised 4 children who are not thrilled by their birthdays. As a Mom I always tried to make it a special day but they just never seem to feel the same way. It might be because 3 of them are born on the same day. But still, there's 1 on his own day and he doesn't seem to care much either. My husband actually does care about his birthday, not a big deal kind of guy but a "let's go somewhere" person.

So, let me again wish myself a big ~ huge ~ stupendous ~ birthday ~ and get on with this blog.

I haven't written in so long. So this will be "catch up" with tidbits of how the last month or so have been going. First, of all, it has now been 1 year since I retired. Talk about time flying . . . do I like retirement? No, I LOVE RETIREMENT!!! After a year I cannot even imagine getting up every morning and going to work. In fact, I wonder how on earth I did it for as long as I did. Really, that's not true, I had to do it, but sleeping in is much better. My husband is retiring in September, on the 3rd of the month. He's, of course, very excited. He has it all planned out. He started working at Conklin Bros. 42 years ago on September 3rd and will exit on the same day. Talk about someone who has worked hard for a lot more years than me, Kent has done it. But he's ready to retire, he has to get up at 6:00 every morning, so he's ready for the sleeping in thing!!

Our daughter, Tina, came for a visit on December 2nd and stayed until January 6th. She was here from Mississippi and was able to see "the kids" and do some things with all of them. But she was captivated by the little Benji boy. He's a heartbreaker that one. He is such a sweet boy and he fell madly in love with "Auntie". It was a good visit and now she's back home in the frozen south. We will take up "skyping" so we can continue to see each other and Benji can talk to Auntie.

Christmas was a bit different for us this year. The boys came over about 12:30 p.m. on Christmas day. We were a family that opens our presents on Christmas morning, but of course we were going to wait for the kids on this Christmas. It seemed like such a long wait, but once they all got here, it got crazy really fast. For Christmas I made our son Jeff a quilt made out of his old rock shirts. I've been hanging onto these old rock shirts for 20 years or so, always with the promise "Someday I'm going to make you a quilt out of your old rock shirts" ~ it was a family joke. But I finally did it this year and it turned out really cool. It was one of the many things that made Christmas special for me this year.

For Christmas, Kenny got me a Kindle. A Kindle is a electronic device that you can download and read books on. I had bought myself one a couple of years ago but wasn't thrilled with it. They had created a new version of it and I was sort of interested in it and the changes they had made. So, I've read a few books on it and I've decided I like it much better this time. I will update my reading section soon but my plan is to read a Kindle book then a regular book, I have such a stash of books still to read.

One of the little things I want to comment on is that with all the beautiful Christmas music we hear during the Christmas season, I always get a little sad when I hear any song by The Carpenters. Karen Carpenter had a beautiful voice and died much to soon but her music still is part of our annual Christmas music experience and I guess maybe I should be happy about that instead of sad. We had a big night out to go see a Christmas concert. Connie, Tina, Gena & Katie (Connie's daughters) and Haley (Connie's son's girlfriend) and I all went out to dinner and then to a Christmas jazz concert. Dave Koz and some very famous jazz musician friends played here in Santa Rosa and we had a night of it. It was really fun and I think everyone had a great time.

Right now, I'm sitting here typing this and my face hurts so bad. I'm being treated for some pre-cancerous spots on my face that basically cover my whole face. I look like I have leprosy. I'm a mess and at this point I don't know when it will all be cleared up, but I'm hopeful and will definitely start wearing sunscreen!!

Okay, this where I will end this little post. Hope everyone that reads it had a Merry, Merry Christmas and a Happy, Happy New Year!! Think positive, it's got to be better than last year!

My thought to leave you with is this: An old Mickey Mantle saying - "If I would've known I was going to live this long I would've taken better care of myself!"

Until next time . . .